Wait for the credits to run on any Pixar movie, and after all the story artists, animators, assistant editors and software engineers get their due, you’ll see a list of “production babies” — children born to employees of the studio the year before the release of the film. “If you ask any of us which movie we were making when one of our kids was born, we’ll be able to tell you instantly,” said director Lee Unkrich. “It’s like our family lives are permanently woven into the movies.” While many parents have pencil marks on their door frames to remind them of how big their kids were in 2001 or 2006, at Pixar artists can access the same information by watching Monsters, Inc. or Cars. As the studio keeps growing, so does the number of infants in the credits. There were 34 production babies in the 1998 film A Bug’s Life, and 58 for Wall-E in 2008, with a lot of twins that year. The creativity of the studio comes through in the names. Audiences won’t see too many Isabellas, Emmas, Jacobs or Ethans in Pixar films, but there’s a Sigourney, Stella, Royal, Oona and a Zazie. If you’re at a Bay Area park and you hear someone calling for Bosco, you’ll have a pretty good idea where his parents work.
